• Photonics Research
  • Vol. 11, Issue 12, 2222 (2023)
Dongrui Yu1, Ziyang Chen1、3、*, Xuan Yang2, Yunlong Xu2, Ziyi Jin2, Panxue Ma2, Yufei Zhang1, Song Yu2, Bin Luo2、4、*, and Hong Guo1、5、*
Author Affiliations
  • 1State Key Laboratory of Advanced Optical Communication Systems and Networks, School of Electronics, and Center for Quantum Information Technology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
  • 2State Key Laboratory of Information Photonics and Optical Communications, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing 100876, China
  • 3e-mail: chenziyang@pku.edu.cn
  • 4e-mail: luobin@bupt.edu.cn
  • 5e-mail: hongguo@pku.edu.cn
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    DOI: 10.1364/PRJ.498810 Cite this Article Set citation alerts
    Dongrui Yu, Ziyang Chen, Xuan Yang, Yunlong Xu, Ziyi Jin, Panxue Ma, Yufei Zhang, Song Yu, Bin Luo, Hong Guo. Time interval measurement with linear optical sampling at the femtosecond level[J]. Photonics Research, 2023, 11(12): 2222 Copy Citation Text show less

    Abstract

    High-precision time interval measurement is a fundamental technique in many advanced applications, including time and distance metrology, particle physics, and ultra-precision machining. However, many of these applications are confined by the imprecise time interval measurement of electrical signals, restricting the performance of the ultimate system to a few picoseconds, which limits ultrahigh precision applications. Here, we demonstrate an optical means for the time interval measurement of electrical signals that can successfully achieve femtosecond (fs) level precision. The setup is established using the optical frequency comb (OFC) based linear optical sampling (LOS) technique to realize timescale-stretched measurement. We achieve a measurement precision of 82 fs for a single LOS scan measurement and 3.05 fs for the 100-times average with post-processing, which is three orders of magnitude higher than the results of older electrical methods. The high-precision time interval measurement of electrical signals can substantially improve precision measurement technologies.
    SEM=σ(T)/n,

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    σfloor=σPLA2+σPLB2+σRINA2+σRINB2,

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    ΔT=αΔτ,(A1)

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    sU1(t)=ng1(tntU1τ1),(A2)

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    sU2(t)=ng2(tntU2τ2),(A3)

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    s1(t)=sU1(t)*hi(t)=sin[2πifU1(tτ1)],(A4)

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    s2(t)=sU2(t)*hj(t)=sin[2πjfU2(tτ2)],(A5)

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    Ai(t)=H[s(t)]=h(t)*s(t)=1πs(τ)tτdτ.(A6)

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    ti=Ai(t)×tdtAi(t)dt,i=1,  2,(A7)

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    sB(tT)=n=0N1cos{0tT{[ω0B+δω0B(t)]+n[ωr+δωrB(t)]}dt},=n=0N1cos{(ω0B+nωr)(tT)+0tT[δω0B(t)+nδωrB(t)]dt},(A8)

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    sX(t)=n=0N1cos{[ω0X+n(ωr+Δωr)]t+0t[δω0X(t)+nδωrX(t)]dt},(A9)

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    I(t)=sB(tT)×sX(t)=nΔωr<2πBcos{(ω0Xω0B+nΔωr){t+ωrΔωr[T+1ωr0tδωrX(t)dt1ωr0tTδωrB(t)dt]}+0tδω0X(t)dt0tTδω0B(t)+(ω0Xω0B)dt}=nΔωr<2πBcos{(Δω0+nΔωr){t+ωrΔωr[T+xX(t)xB(tT)]}+φ0X(t)φ0B(tT)},(A10)

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    xLOS(t)=ωrΔωrxX(t)2+xB(t)2.(A11)

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    xT(t)=ωrΔωrxA(t)2+xB(t)2,(A12)

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    Dongrui Yu, Ziyang Chen, Xuan Yang, Yunlong Xu, Ziyi Jin, Panxue Ma, Yufei Zhang, Song Yu, Bin Luo, Hong Guo. Time interval measurement with linear optical sampling at the femtosecond level[J]. Photonics Research, 2023, 11(12): 2222
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